Transcript

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>> Morning class begins in Indonesia's coastal town, Bekasi. By afternoon, the classroom is a swamp. For Anisa Ramadani and her classmates, it's part of their daily routine. Reuters' Kanupriya Kapoor visited the school at high tide.>> What happens is that the schoolchildren are having to wade through water.

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They're having to go to muddy classrooms. Their schoolyard is swampy. There's crabs running around, fish swimming around in their schoolyard and not in a fun way. But what's really quite striking is the resilience that this community and these schoolchildren show. They still show up to class every day.

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They still want to learn, and they still want to have a better future for themselves.>> Heading home doesn't bring relief. The problem of rising sea levels in Indonesia is widespread. Residents wade through the streets, propping anything electric, like fridges or TVs, on concrete blocks. It's the grim result of both environmental destruction and climate change.

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And it's a daily reminder of the threat a sinking coastline poses to millions of people who live alongside it. Some leave, others have nowhere to go. A new seawall protects the capital, Jakarta, 40% of which is under the sea level. But waves still reach large parts of the city, forcing people to use sandbags for protection.

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Indonesia's made of thousands of islands with over 80,000 kilometers of coastline. It's also home to more than a fifth of the world's mangrove forests, which naturally help keep tides out. But for years, coastal communities have been cutting them down to make way for fish farms and rice fields.

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Now, almost half of what was there 30 years ago is gone. The government's scrambling to replant them, build dikes and relocate people away from the encroaching sea.>> It is going to be very hard to stop the advance of the sea because all of the mangroves have been cut down.

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To replant them take years and years and by that time, it's going to be too late. And a lot of these communities will be forced to move.